Tutorials

Fabric Flower Tutorial #1

 This is a photo tutorial for making these easy fabric flowers. Once you learn how to make them you may be addicted and want to put them on everything, so be warned! I like using them to make headbands, hair pins, or even pin them on plain cardigans to dress them up a bit. Really, there are so many possibilities. You can leave them plain or add beads, jewels, or buttons to the center of them as well.

Okay, so first you need a strip of fabric, about 18 inches long and about 2 inches wide, but really the fabric length is up to you. The longer the strip the bigger your flower will end up being.

*So lay out the strip like this. Then take one end and fold it in half hot dog style (think back to elementary school!)The fold that same end in half again so that it looks like the picture on the right. It helps to secure this with some hot glue.

*Next, take the folded end and begin to roll it so that it starts to look like a cinnamon roll. Continue to roll the fabric until you get it the "bud" about the size of your pinky nail. Again, the size it really up to you. When you have the bud size you want make sure to secure it with some glue.

*Now you are going to begin the folding process that will give you the "petals" of the flower. This part was the hardest for me to learn, so I will do my best to explain it.



*Make sure the fabric strip is still folded in half, but only once, not twice like it was when we made the bud. Fold the strip back and down and continue doing this around the bud. Do this a few times, remember to secure every couple of folds with a little dab of hot glue.



*As the flower begins to grow, change the folding just a bit: Instead of going tight around the bud, pull the folds out a little so they are flat...remember to secure with glue!

The back should look like this

*Keep working around until you run out of fabric. Then secure the end to the back of the flower. You can keep the flower the size that it is or you can cut another strip of fabric (preferably a bit wider, maybe 1/2 an inch, since you are going to be making bigger folds at this point) and glue it to the back of the flower and then keep going.




              *Then, Voila! A cute fabric flower.